Greater Lansing
Mold removal & remediation
Eight mold jobs sit on eleven months of invoices and every one of them had water behind it. Here is how the water gets found first, where the honest line falls between a repair and a certified remediator, and the three questions worth asking whoever you hire.
What is actually wrong
Mold is a water problem wearing a different costume. Eight mold jobs sit on eleven months of this company’s invoices and every one of them had a water source behind it — a disconnected downspout, a sewage backup, a shower leaking at the pan, standing ground water, a blocked gutter. Clean the mold and leave the water and you have booked the same visit again for spring. So the first thing that happens here is finding out where the water is coming from, and that happens before anybody quotes a cleaning.
The second thing to know is that the size of the patch decides who should be doing the work, and it is not a judgment about skill. Federal guidance puts the line at roughly ten square feet — about a three-foot square. Under that, careful removal and treatment is ordinary repair work. Over it, the job is containment: sealing the room off, running the air pressure negative so spores leave the building instead of traveling through it, and taking the material out under that protection. That needs equipment and a certification, and this page says plainly which side of the line it works on.
Michigan licenses nobody to do mold work, and that cuts both ways. There is no state license to check, which means anybody can have "mold remediation" printed on a van and nothing stops them. The questions worth asking instead are what certification they hold — IICRC or ACAC are the real ones — what containment they intend to use, and whether they will tell you where the water came from. A contractor who cannot answer the third one is going to leave you with the problem.
And bleach, which almost everybody has already tried by the time they call. On a hard, non-porous surface — tile, glazed block, sealed concrete, glass — bleach is genuinely fine. On porous material it is close to useless: it does not reach what has grown inside drywall paper, bare wood, carpet or particle board, and the water it carries can leave things worse than it found them. Porous material does not get cleaned. It comes out.
Where this stops
When it is not a handyman job
This is at the top of the page rather than the bottom because getting it wrong costs you a wasted visit. Insured, and no contractor license is claimed or implied — the Michigan residential builder license is not held.
- Inspection and surface treatment only, with remediation past small areas referred to a certified specialist. That is this company’s own wording on its own invoices and it is not softened on the page where softening it would be most profitable.
- No containment remediation. There are no negative-air machines, no HEPA containment barriers and no whole-house treatment here. Past roughly ten square feet, anywhere in the heating and cooling ductwork, or where the growth is through insulation across an area, that is the right call and it gets made rather than worked around.
- No air testing and no clearance testing. If you can see it, a test mostly tells you what you already know, and a clearance test by the company that did the removal is worth nothing to anybody. Where a test is genuinely useful — a dispute, a health complaint with nothing visible, or signing off somebody else’s remediation — it goes to an independent testing firm.
- No health advice, at all. Whether mold is making somebody in the house ill is a question for a doctor, and a contractor answering it is a contractor guessing about your health.
- Anything in the ductwork goes to a specialist. You cannot clean a duct run from a basement floor and nobody should pretend to.
- Mold is a symptom. Where the cause is a roof, a grade, a foundation or a plumbing fault beyond this company, it is named on the paperwork and referred rather than absorbed.
- No mold warranty, and be careful of anybody offering one. What is warranted here is the repair and the water fix. Whether mold returns depends on whether the water stays fixed, and a guarantee that implies otherwise is a sales device.
- If somebody in the house has asthma, a respiratory condition or a compromised immune system, say so on the phone. It moves the line in this page earlier rather than later, deliberately.
The work itself
What actually gets done
Find the water first and name it, before quoting any cleaning. This is the part most of the trade skips and it is the only part that decides whether the mold comes back.
Small-area removal: affected porous material cut out and bagged — drywall, insulation, carpet and pad, trim, particle board, shelving.
Hard, non-porous surfaces cleaned down and treated. Block, concrete, framing, tile and glass.
Scope behind a wall where there is a musty smell and nothing visible, rather than guessing at where to cut.
Fix the cause, which is usually cheaper than the cleaning: a downspout extended away from the wall, a gutter cleared, a splash zone regraded, a wall crack sealed, a failed shower pan, a sump pump that stopped.
Dry it properly and prove it with a moisture reading before anything closes up.
Rebuild afterwards — board, tape, trim and paint — so you are not left with a hole and a second contractor to find.
Write down what was found and what was done, with photographs, which is the document a landlord, a tenant or an insurer actually needs.
Say plainly when it is past this company, and what to ask the remediator we point you at.
This work sits inside General Repairs, which carries the invoiced price bands for the trade with the sample size printed beside every figure.
What it costs
There is no price list for this, and here is what actually decides the number.
The same three words describe a twenty-minute job and a two-day one. Rather than publish a figure that is wrong for one of them, here is what moves it — so you can work out roughly which end of it you are at before anybody comes out.
Area, and which side of roughly ten square feet it falls on. That one answer changes who does the job, not just the price.
Whether the water source is already known. An unexplained musty smell is a diagnosis followed by a repair, and they are two things.
Hard surfaces or porous material. Cleaning block is an afternoon; cutting out and replacing wet drywall and insulation is a different job.
Whether it is behind something — a wall, a cabinet run, a finished basement stud wall — and what has to come off to reach it.
What the fix to the cause is. Extending a downspout is cheap. A regrade or a failed shower pan is not.
Occupied or empty, and how much has to be covered and moved first.
Whether you want the rebuild as part of it, which is quoted as its own lines rather than assumed.
How to get a real number
Somebody comes out, looks at it properly, and you get a fixed price in writing with the work set out line by line and the exclusions written down as plainly as the inclusions. Coming out to do that is not charged for, and neither is working out what is wrong. If something is found once a wall or a floor is open, it is priced as a written change order and you decide before the work carries on rather than after it is billed. Materials are supplied at cost with the receipt attached, first-time customers get 10% off labor, and labor carries a one-year craftsmanship warranty.
If this is happening right now
What to do in the next five minutes, and what happens when you ring.
Before anybody arrives
- Photograph it, and photograph what is directly above it and on the other side of the wall. Mold grows where water lands, not where water comes in.
- Go and find the water, and if it is raining, go outside while it is raining. A downspout running onto the ground at the wall, a gutter overflowing at a corner, or a flower bed sloping toward the house explains more basement mold than foundations do.
- Do not point a fan at it. Moving air across mold is how a problem in one room becomes a problem in four.
- Do not bleach porous material and do not paint over it. Painting over mold hides it for one season and takes the option of a clean repair away.
- Put a dehumidifier in the room and keep it running. Lowering the humidity is the one thing available to you that stops it getting worse while you work out what to do.
- Bag and take out the soft things it has reached — carpet, pad, cardboard, upholstered furniture. They are what is holding it.
- Do not start pulling a large area apart yourself. Disturbing it without containment is the one way to make a contained problem into a whole-house one.
Call the business line
(517) 505-7135Answered Monday to Friday, 08:00 to 18:00. There is no out-of-hours line and this page is not going to invent one — outside those hours, leave a message with the address and what is happening, and it is picked up in the morning.
On the call you get asked what is happening, what else in the building is affected, and whether it is still getting worse. That is how it gets decided whether this is our job at all — and if it is not, you get told that on the phone rather than after somebody has driven out.
- No trip charge
- No call-out fee or minimum
- No diagnostic fee
- No charge for a return visit
True across all 84 written quotes this company has issued. Most contractors in this market charge to turn up.
Or send the detailsWhen the right answer is not this company
- You can smell gas
- Leave the building and call the utility from outside. Not us, and not later.
- Water you cannot stop
- Your main shut-off first, then a licensed plumber. Every minute of this one costs money.
- Sewage backing up, or several fixtures at once
- A licensed plumber with a camera. That is the shared line, not a fixture, and a cable down one sink will not touch it.
- Sparking, scorching or a burning smell at an outlet or a panel
- Breaker off, and a licensed electrician. Electrical work here is repair and like-for-like replacement, and this is neither.
- No heat, or heating and cooling equipment that has failed
- A licensed mechanical contractor. That trade is not offered here at all, and knowing that in one phone call is worth more than a visit.
Questions people actually ask
Do you remove mold?
Small areas, yes, and the honest line is drawn by area rather than by what we would like to sell. Roughly ten square feet — about a three-foot square — is the point federal guidance puts it at. Under that, cutting out the affected material, cleaning the hard surfaces and fixing the water is ordinary repair work and it is done here regularly. Over it, the job needs containment and negative air pressure so that spores leave the building rather than travel through it, and that goes to a certified remediator. We will tell you which one you have, and coming out to find that out is free.
Is a mold remediation license required in Michigan?
No, and that is worth knowing before you hire anybody. Michigan has no state mold license at all, so there is nothing to look up and nothing stopping any company from putting the word on a van. What is worth asking about instead is certification — IICRC and ACAC are the credentials that mean something — what containment they plan to use, and whether they will tell you where the water came from. The third question is the one that sorts them out.
Do I need a mold test?
Usually not, if you can see it. A test on visible growth mostly confirms what is already in front of you and the money is better spent on the removal and on the water. Testing earns its keep in three situations: a dispute between a landlord and a tenant, a health complaint where nothing is visible, or signing off on a remediation somebody else performed. All three want an independent testing firm — not us, and not the company that did the removal, because a clearance test by whoever did the work is worth nothing.
Does bleach kill mold?
On a hard, non-porous surface, yes — tile, glass, sealed concrete, glazed block. On porous material it is close to useless, because what is growing is inside the drywall paper, the bare wood, the carpet backing or the particle board, and bleach does not reach it; the water it carries can also leave things damper than they started. This is why porous material is removed rather than cleaned. It is also why the bleach that got sprayed in March is usually still on the invoice as a problem in June.
Why does the mold keep coming back?
Because the water is still arriving. Every mold job on this company’s invoices had a water source behind it, and the cleaning is the easy half — a disconnected downspout, an overflowing gutter, ground sloping toward the house, a shower leaking at the pan, a sump pump that stopped. Treating the growth and not the cause is a repeat visit with your money in it, which is why nothing gets quoted here until somebody has found the water.
Is the mold in my house making me ill?
That is a question for a doctor and we are not going to answer it. A contractor speculating about your health is a contractor guessing. What we will do is tell you what is there, where the water is coming from, and whether the removal is ours or a certified remediator’s — and if anybody in the house has asthma, a respiratory condition or a compromised immune system, say so when you ring, because it moves that line earlier on purpose.
What does mold removal cost?
There is no rate card. It is set by the area and which side of roughly ten square feet it falls on, whether the water source is already known, whether the surfaces are hard or porous, whether it is behind a wall or a cabinet run, and what the fix to the cause turns out to be — which is frequently the cheapest line on the quote. Somebody comes out, finds the water, and puts a fixed price in writing with the exclusions on it. Coming out is not charged for.
Do you work in Lansing, Haslett, East Lansing, Okemos and Holt?
Yes — Greater Lansing and the towns around it, which is where almost all of this company’s work is.
Book a mold inspection
Send photographs of the growth and of whatever is directly above it, and say when you first noticed it and whether it follows the rain. Somebody comes out, finds the water, and tells you whether the removal is ours or a specialist's — with a fixed price in writing either way. Coming out is free, and there is no trip charge.